I'm not sure what world history they teach in America? Great Britain (it wasn't England) was a formidable european power for most of the past millenium. It existed in different guises, but over the later centuries, colonialism happened. That was when the 'enlightened' european nations (GB, France, Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, etc), took their modern ways (and warfare) to pre-industrial societies. Once there, the europeans butchered the locals with their superior weapons. In those latter centuries of the last millenium, european colonialism stripped wealth and resources from those countries (India, the Middle East, much of Africa). And of course, latterly, what came to be known as the New World. America. Referenced above, sugar became a prime commodity. Sugar, cotton, and tobacco. From India it was herbs, tea, textiles and agriculture. At one point, the East India Company (which effectively ruled over much of India- read oppressed) was basically the worlds largest mega-corporation.
The common theme in that resource stripping was slavery. Using an unpaid slave workforce allowed the wealthy euro-elites to reap tremendous profits. With great wealth comes more greed, and eventually conflict. Europe went into decline in the early 20th century as WWI tore the map apart. Then in WWII, the financial burden sank it. It was only after WWII that America's ascendency properly began. America - the last colony (and still effectively a colony as it displaced the native population). And that's not politics - that's history.
On this point:
The missing piece is that until the war of independence, the New World colonies financially supported their european 'masters'. And the empire was built over a long time by conquest and oppression of what were deemed inferior nations (and white supremacy was considered a fact by western powers back then). The colonial powers were as ruthless to the natives as the bad people from WWII-era Germany were to ethnics. If you read into it, a staggeringly enormous amount of famine induced deaths happened under British rule in India (when the UK was rolling in gold, Indian's were dying in vast numbers). The conservative estimate was that over a 40-year period, there were fifty million excess deaths. The expanded figure is as high as 165 million.
And this:
Native people had no choice. we 'civilised' them and brought them english, the King/Queen, and our religion. Remember, the empire wasn't built on war, where similar nations were defeated (we lost South Africa to the Dutch when we squared up to them). It was literally the oppression of people and culture. Assimilation. The empire was basically the Borg.
Clearly, there is more to it than ^^. But you get the jist. Europeans colonised anything they could that couldn't put up a fight (Australia is in there, too). America is part of that legacy. A colony that declared independence from the UK, but still colonised the native people of the land (again, same as Australia. And Canada). Basically, all the english speaking, 'white', nations are former colonies UK that, even after independence, continued to oppress the native people (which is colonialism by proxy). The same is true of the Spanish/Portuguese speaking nations from Mexico down to Chile. All colonised by Europeans. As for gaining independence from Europe? All that happened is the colony changed hands.
All a bit grim really.
